Posted
by
timothy
on Monday August 01, 2005 @06:58AM
from the putting-pressure dept.

TheRaindog writes "AMD has bolstered its dual-core processor lineup with a more affordable dual-core Athlon 64 X2 3800+ that will sell for only $354. Despite its comparatively low 2.0GHz clock speed and only 512KB of L2 cache per core, the X2 3800+ is often faster than Intel's fastest dual-core chips, including the $999 Pentium Extreme Edition 840. The new X2's incredibly low power consumption is also impressive, especially when compared with that of power-hungry Pentium D processors that consume 50-90% more power under load."

The problem right now is there is just not enough of a gain to justify buying a dual core chip for the average consumer.They are generally outperformed by chips which cost a lot less (except in programs which can make use of the SMP set up).SMP will start to take hold in the future and more and more programs will be optimised for an SMP set up but this leaves us with a catch

Given what your average person does with a computer, they are in fact running many background tasks at any given time. On a Windows XP box being run by anyone normal, you'll probably find some sort of system software (anti-virus, Windows Update, Windows Firewall and/or ZoneAlarm), some sort of P2P software (hopefully Shareaza;-), maybe some email software, and a game running over all of it. If they're media nuts, it's possible they're ripping a CD, encoding some files, and/or recording a TV show off a tu

The average consumer basically uses the computer to perhaps write school/uni/office work , check e-mails,maybe copy/burn a CD, browse the internet , maybe listen to music now and then and perhaps play the odd game. For almost all of those things a Dual core system is over kill.As part of my work I do on occasion advise companies and private individuals on systems.I do not make money on selling the systems , I make money on the consultancy.

I have spoken to managers who spout to me a bunch of computer jargon they have no idea the meaning of , explaining to me how a sales man had told them that their office computers will need 3Ghz processors with 1GB of ram for simple office work. Same for many of the normal folks i speak to , They have walked into some PC shop and been advised that their 1Ghz pentium 3 is far too slow for modern e-mail browsing and using an office program.

Sure Dual core would speed them up , but not by anything close to justify paying twice the price for the processor . There in is my argument,The advantages do not out weigh the negatives.Sure you will have a more responsive system whilst doing multiple heavy duty tasks , but ordinary users do not do many heavy duty tasks at the same time.Background process such as AV programs whilst consuming a fair amount of resources during a scan are negligible during regular monitoring tasks.Sure if your an enthusiast

Look to the future though, with Vista coming out, and increasing loads put on the system by running other cpu and io intensive GUI's, multicore does and will provide acceptable performance. Being able to offload the OS to a second core increases responsiveness in general.

I used to have a dual pentium pro that was slick as butter on a hot ass in July that was better than any pentium 2.

I didn't have a problem with Apple dumping Power architecture as much as the idea that, by going with Intel, they will turn their backs on HyperTransport and AMD's excellent use of it. Apple could try to steal Dell's shoes if they'd come out with desktops with that kind of power and AMD under the hood.I really have to wonder if Intel's choice wasn't so much the pretense of "power per watt" as much as it was Steve Jobs taking offense at the shade of green in the AMD logo, or something. I'm not flaming; I wan

I know this might sound silly but considering the speed technology moves, my age and lifestyle - I can't afford anymore to spend 1000$ US a year upgrading my PC just as a hobby.I love them sure and have done for years but the time for hardware companies to make a mint in high priced low volume items is in my opinion ending rapidly.

I'm sure there's a lot of other guys out there like me who are now over 25 and have a good rig or two, maybe a laptop and a nice TV that kind of thing and just don't truely see wh

I mean sure there's CPU's which are 50% faster again - but are they worth 350$ US ?

Processors are fast enough now that it's easy to wait for a 2x performance boost over a period of 4 or so years before upgrading.

Plus you've got to remember, this thing is two CPUs. I've been running my Dual MP 1800+ for almost 4 years now (Actually XPs with some conductive paint). A dual core 3800+ for $300 seems like a bargain to me. More than twice the performance for less money than I paid for what I've got. Near top-of-

I know the feeling. I gave up long before you, though: my PC is an 800 MHz P-III. I also bought a used 1.1 GHz ThinkPad. They do me just fine. There are a few times I wish I had something faster, but I just cannot justify the expense. My kids have a 3.2 GHz P-4. We had to get that to be able to play current games. Me, I don't need anything that fast since I think the pinnacle of computer games was Zork.

would be to ONLY offer dual-core CPUs. If my only choice is a dual-core, I'll definitely buy one. In fact, you don't even need to advertise heavily it is a dual-core chip. And if you more or less stop making single-core processors, the average consumer won't know the difference. This would give a true mandate to the technology and accelerate development of applications that take advantage of SMP.

I do still think it's a viable route towards pushing SMP, though. It's most likely how Apple would've handled dual-core processors in their product lines had they stayed with PowerPC, and will handle it with the switch away from IBM CPUs.

It's different for Apple. If Apple had stuck with PowerPC, there'd be no choice for your PPC chip other than what Apple decided to put in their G# PCs.
For AMD to only offer SMP processors would be suicide. With as low market share as they have, they simply can't afford to drop more than half their product line in order to push the technological envelope. Intel, with money literally falling out of their assholes, can stand to take this risk and can probably bully enough OEMs to only carry dual core chips t

If you call 10% of the market (that is, the mainstream commercial market) a 'decent amount,' then yes, they have a decent amount. Unfortunately Intel dominates a good 70-75% with IBM and the likes taking whatever bits are left.And barring any significant changes from the Intel/AMD lawsuit, Intel can still bully OEMs into keeping 90% Intel stock and not advertising AMD products. If AMD went solely dual core, OEMs would most likely drop them entirely because costs would be too high and Intel could backhand th